Ex Parte Obrea et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 20, 2014

11595413 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 20, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte ANDREI OBREA and CHRISTIAN CREWS
___________

Appeal 2011-006589
Application 11/595,413
Technology Center 2600
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Before MICHAEL R. ZECHER, TRENTON A. WARD, and
GEORGIANNA W. BRADEN, Administrative Patent Judges.

BRADEN, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

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This is an appeal
1
under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection
of claims 1-8 and 11-32. Claims 9 and 10 were objected to as being
dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in
independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any
intervening claim. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ Invention
Appellants’ invention relates to a method of creating a document that
allows for authenticating and verifying the integrity of the
document. Spec. ¶¶ 0008, 0012.

Illustrative Claim
Independent claims 1 and 18 are illustrative of the claimed invention,
and are reproduced below:
1. A method for creating a document that allows for
authenticating and verifying integrity of the document, the
method comprising:
creating the document having an area of interest containing
information that varies from other documents of a same type;
segmenting the area of interest on the document into a plurality
of elements;
obtaining the average gray scale of each element;
inserting the average gray scale of each element into an
identifier; and

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Appellants represent that the Real Party-in-Interest is Pitney Bowes,
Inc. App. Br. 2.
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attaching the identifier to the document.

18. A method for creating a document that allows for
authenticating and verifying integrity of the document, the
method comprising:
creating a document having an area of interest containing
information that varies from other documents of a same type;
obtaining a perceptual hash of the area of interest;
inserting the perceptual hash into an identifier; and
attaching the identifier to the document.

Examiner’s Rejections
1. Claims 1-8, 15-25, and 30-32 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as
being anticipated by Tuttle et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,785,405 B2
(“Tuttle”). Ans. 3-8.

2. Claims 11-14 and 26-29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Tuttle in view of Wolff et al., U.S. Pub. No.
2005/0258246 A1 (“Wolff”). Ans. 8-11.

ISSUE 1
§ 102(b) Rejection of Claims 1-8 and 15-17
Appellants contend that Tuttle fails to disclose a number of claim
elements recited in independent claim 1. Specifically, Appellants argue that
Tuttle does not disclose the limitations “segmenting the area of interest on
the document into a plurality of elements,” “inserting the average gray scale
of each element into an identifier,” and “attaching the identifier to the
document,” as recited in independent claim 1. App. Br. 4-8.

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ANALYSIS
Appellants first contend the intended use of the claimed methods
(authenticating a document such as a driver’s license) is different from or
not analogous to Tuttle (determining that a document is a driver’s
license). App. Br. 4-5. However, according to Tuttle, the disclosed method
is capable of authenticating a document or determining if the document has
been altered. Tuttle at Abstract. Furthermore, Appellants’ Specification
lists several types of documents (e.g., a driver’s license) that can be
authenticated by Appellants’ claimed method. Spec. ¶ 0009. Therefore, we
do not find Appellants’ non-analogous argument to be persuasive.
Appellants then contend that the system in Tuttle does not segment
the area of interest containing information that varies from other documents
of a same type. App. Br. 5. According to Appellant, this varying
information is equivalent to the “dynamic” information in Tuttle, which is
expressly ignored during the processing of Tuttle. Id. However, the
Examiner finds that Tuttle equates the area of interest in a document with the
entire document as a whole. Ans. 11. The Examiner reasons that the entire
image “can be broken up into a grid of sub-regions or segments . . .,” so the
claimed “plurality of elements” equates to the “subregions or segments” of
Tuttle. Ans. 12 (citing Tuttle at col. 5, ll. 64-66). The Board agrees with the
Examiner’s finding. If the entire document in Tuttle is segmented, then the
area of interest on the document would be broken into a plurality of
elements, thereby meeting the claimed segmenting the area of interest on the
document into a plurality of elements.
Appellants next dispute the Examiner’s finding that: (i) the term
“dynamic” is indefinite; and (ii) there is a difference between Tuttle and the
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present invention based on the indefinite term “dynamic,” which has no
basis and is clearly improper. App. Br. 6. However, the Examiner did not
reject the claims under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph for failing to
particularly point out and distinctly claim the invention. Ans. 12.
Therefore, this issue is not properly before the Board and will not be
addressed. See Manual of Patent Examining Procedure § 706.01 (only a
rejection involving the merits of a claim is subject to review by the Board.)
Appellants further contend that the system in Tuttle does not insert the
average gray scale of each element into an identifier, as recited in claim
1. App. Br. 6. Appellants direct our attention to Tuttle’s disclosure of
segmenting an image and characterizing a segment based on its
properties. Id. (citing Tuttle at col. 5, l. 56-col. 6, l. 26). Appellants argue
that Tuttle fails to disclose the aformentioned claim
limitation. Id. Appellants finally contend that Tuttle fails to disclose
attaching the identifier to the document, as is recited in claim 1. App. Br.
7. According to Appellants, the storage of each segment of a reference
image in a database is not equivalent to attaching the identifier to
the document. Id. Appellants argue that, because the system in Tuttle
expressly ignores any information that makes the document different from
other documents of the same type, it cannot determine if the information
included in the area of interest has been altered. App. Br. 7-8.
Contrary to the Appellants’ arguments, the Examiner finds that Tuttle
explicitly discloses a database (the “identifier”) and that the measures
(including the average gray scale) are stored in that database. Ans. 13
(citing Tuttle at col. 6, l. 27-l. 31 (database) and col. 6, ll. 5-11 (gray
scale)). The Examiner specifically equates the identifier with the
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database. Id. The Examiner further finds that Tuttle expressly inserts the
average gray scale into an identifier. Ans. 14 (citing Tuttle at col. 6, ll. 27-
31). According to the Examiner, the identifier is attached or associated with
the document and such attachment occurs when storing the average
grayscale of that particular segment in the document to a database, i.e.,
linking that particular identifier to the particular segment in the document in
the database. The Examiner concludes that the average gray scale stored in
the database (the identifier) cannot ever again be associated with that
document unless the database is “attached” to the document. Id.
Appellants’ contentions appear to be based on a narrow claim scope,
which is inconsistent with the broadest reasonable interpretation of the
claims. In re ICON Health & Fitness, Inc., 496 F.3d 1374, 1379 (Fed. Cir.
2007). According to the Examiner, the claims, as currently written and read
in light of the Specification, encompass the process of Tuttle where the
measures of sub-regions (or segments) are stored in a database. It is
inherently understood that a database must identify documents in order to
store and/or retrieve the documents. Based on the disclosure in Tuttle, the
measures of the sub-regions can be read to be document identifiers used by
the database, because the measures are unique identifiers of a document.
Furthermore, the measures are “attached” or associated with the document
when the document is store in the database and the database uses such
information to store and/or retrieve the document. Appellants have not
pointed to any definitions or disavowals in the Specification that clearly
explain why the Examiner’s broadest reasonable interpretation is in error.
Thus, we agree with the Examiner’s findings.
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Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s anticipation rejection of
independent claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). Claims 2-8 and 15-17
depend, directly or indirectly, from independent claim 1. We also sustain
the Examiner’s anticipation rejection of claims 2-8 and 15-17 under
35 U.S.C. § 102(b).

ISSUE 2
§ 102(b) Rejection of Claim 18-25 and 30-32
Appellants contend that Tuttle fails to disclose a number of claim
elements recited in independent claim 18. Specifically, Appellants argue
that Tuttle does not disclose the limitation “obtaining a perceptual hash of
the area of interest” and “inserting the perceptual hash into an identifier,” as
recited in independent claim 18. App. Br. 8-12.
ANALYSIS
According to Appellants, Tuttle describes how image matching can be
performed by comparing the gray scale of one image to the gray scale of
another image, but at no point in Tuttle is a perceptual hash of the area of
interest obtained. App. Br. 10. Appellants refer to the Specification to
explain that a perpetual hash is a string of binary data that changes
significantly when the image from which it was calculated changes in a way
that would be noticeable for a human observer, but it changes very little due
to variations of the image typically associated with scanning noise, variation
due to skew, scale, luminosity, etc. Id. (citing Spec. ¶ 0048). Appellants
contend that comparing the average gray scale of images is not related to
obtaining a perceptual hash, as determining a hash for an image is not the
same in any respect as comparing luminance or gray scale of two
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images. Id. Appellants further contend that the system in Tuttle does not
insert the perceptual hash into an identifier, as is recited in claim 18. Id.
According to Appellants, Tuttle describes how an image can be segmented
and how the properties of each segment can be used to characterize it, but
Tuttle fails to disclose, teach, or suggest inserting a perceptual hash into an
identifier, as is recited in claim 18. App. Br. 11.
However, the Examiner finds that Tuttle discloses the use of a
perceptual hash and the insertion of such a hash into an identifier. Ans. 15.
According to the Examiner, the Appellants’ Specification gives explicit
examples of measures typically associated with perceptual hash including
“skew, scale, luminosity, etc.” Id. (citing Spec. ¶ 0048). The Examiner
finds that Tuttle discloses a measure typically associated with perceptual
hash, namely, luminosity. Id. (citing Tuttle at col. 6, ll. 5-11). We agree
with the Examiner’s findings.
Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s anticipation rejection of
independent claim 18 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). Claims 19-25 and 30-32
depend, directly or indirectly, from independent claim 18. We also sustain
the Examiner’s anticipation rejection of claims 19-25 and 30-32 under
35 U.S.C. § 102(b).

ISSUE 3
§ 103(a) Rejection of Claims 11-14 and 26-29
Appellants state that each of claims 11-14 and 26-29 is dependent
upon claims 1 and 18, respectively, and therefore, include all of the
limitations of claims 1 and 18. App. Br. 12. Appellants contend that Tuttle
does not disclose, teach, or suggest all of the limitations of claims 1 or 18,
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and Wolff does not cure any of the deficiencies of Tuttle, as it was relied
upon for other features. Id. Therefore, Appellants argue that Tuttle in view
of Wolff does not render the cited claims obvious.
As discussed above, there are no deficiencies in Tuttle for Wolff to
cure. Thus, we conclude that Tuttle in view of Wolff renders the cited
claims obvious. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s obviousness
rejection of claims 11-14 and 26-29 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-8 and 11-32 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

ELD